'I was reasonably philosophical but I just wanted to be on my own. I didn’t care about the money and I felt sorry for the fans' - Notts County owner Alan Hardy

In his latest exclusive Post column, Notts County owner Alan Hardy looks back over the high of beating Crewe 4-1 in front of a record crowd at Meadow Lane, before suffering the low of an 8-1 defeat to Swansea in the FA Cup fourth round replay

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But with half an hour to play you feared whether it would become double figures given Swansea’s ruthlessness in front of goal. Had it been 10 or 11, I was worried about the impact it would have on the young players.

I have to say Swansea’s level of finishing was sensational and it was in complete contrast to Spurs versus Newport, which saw the Premier League side miss a stack of chances in the last 15 minutes.

Notts County boss Kevin Nolan on the touchline against Swansea City in the FA Cup replay (Image: Getty)

That could have easily been six, seven or eight, but the movement of Swansea was exceptional, particularly that of Nathan Dyer and Tammy Abraham.

They had just beaten Arsenal and Liverpool and they were clearly a team full of confidence. I’ve never seen movement like it. It reinforced the gulf between the top-flight and League Two.

In that respect I thought some of the criticism of us was unfair when you compare and contrast the wages our players are on with those at Swansea for example. That difference in salary is there for a reason.

I didn’t sleep well afterwards as I didn’t doze off until 3am. I was reasonably philosophical but I just wanted to be on my own. I didn’t care about the money and I felt sorry for the fans because they were astonishingly good. They never stopped singing and the majority of them would have travelled back that night.

It wasn’t a nice feeling knowing they had seen the team lose 8-1 but we move on and now our sole focus is the league, in which we have a massive game at Barnet this weekend.

We are in an excellent position, although it is incredibly tight at the top.

With six of the top eight playing each other this weekend, it represents a good chance to open up a slight gap on some of our rivals.

Let’s hope we can end the week with a win as we chase our ultimate goal - to seal one of those automatic promotion places.